The Validity of Upgrade Saturation in the Eldar Army

I've been playing Eldar for about 15 years now and there never was a day when people didn't say; "What? you're taking that upgrade! BUT ITS SOOO EXPENSIVE!" Most of these people were not seeing the overall utility that this upgrade gave to not just the unit that took it, but the entire army. There is no army in which upgrades play such a major role for than the Eldar. This is true from grenades, to exarches and their abilities, to the legendary (a.k.a. infamous) Holo-Fields, which can change the entire role of a unit in the battle. The commander who buys every upgrade available in an attempt to make his units capable of approaching every situation will end up having half the units of a balanced army, and a third of a bare bones army. In this article I will speak of my own particular style and why I take such upgrade saturated units, and where I do not take these upgrades. Before I even begin I state rule one: You should never EVER take all upgrades just because you can, upgrades which do not contribute to the overall theme of your armies method, upgrades you don't necessarily expect to actually use, or upgrades that you do not understand how to use correctly.

I also want to get this out now. There is a point when equipment comes in when building an army list, but no matter how badass an upgrade, or a single unit is, having a balanced army that can deal with expected enemy threats (such as anti-personnel needs, anti-tank, dealing with the enemies firepower and CC, etc) is number one. An army with one HQ two-five man troop squads and a Super Heavy is not balanced, and is not likely to win. Even such important upgrades as a Falcon's Holo-Field's, or that Farseer with Guide can be done without if you play intelligently with a balanced army. Make your army, then enhance it.

I am a Biel-Tan player to the core, and am fully mechanized. I find that the most important thing in 40k, and indeed in war, is maintaining the initiative. Eldar are able to this with disgusting speed and elite troops so as to be able to make precision attacks and attain local superiority with ease. While our vehicles and units are the base of all of this, for me the equipment seals the deal. My typical list is as follows:

HQ: 130 8%

125-Autarch-Jetbike-Mandiblasters-Scorpion Chain Sword-Fusion Gun

Elites: 512 32%

168-Harlequins (6)-5x Harlequins Kiss-Shadow Seer

189-Howling Bansees (10)-Exarch-Executioner-Acrobatic-War Shout

155-Wave Serpent-2xShuriken Cannons-SS-Vectored Engines-Star Engines

Troops: 560 35%

152-Dire Avengers (10)-Exarch-Twin Shuriken Catapults-Defend

155-Wave Serpent-2xShuriken Cannons-SS-Vectored Engines-Star Engines

132-Jetbikes (6)

121-Jetbikes (3)-Warlock-Destructor

Fast Attack: 60 4%

60-Vyper-2xShuriken Cannon

Heavy Support: 345 22%

185-Falcon-Scatter Laser-Shuriken Cannon-SS-Holo Fields-Star Engines

160-Fire Prism-SS-Holo Fields

-1607-

There are many fully valid philosophies on how to purchase upgrades when looking at an army or a unit as a whole. They all tend to be on a spectrum between taking no upgrades in an attempt to maximize the sheer number of units deployed, and taking as many upgrades as possible to field a 'true grit' elite force. Either end, as with all extremes, errs on folly. Taking too many upgrades will cause your force to be heavily outnumbered by even the smallest opposing army, which will loose you the initiative, because of army balance (not being able to take all the units and unit types you want and need, as stated above in the second paragraph), being able to be easily manipulated with so few units to his many, and other reasons. Taking too few upgrades can make units borderline useless; nothing but meat shields which are hard to wield and get in the way.

There are many aspects to upgrades, equipment, and extra options, one of them being opportunity cost. This is an economy term meaning basically what you could get instead of what you have. Where this comes in, in 40k is in decisions like should I take an extra Swooping Hawk, or give my Exarch a Sunrifle? Well you get an extra body with the additional standard hawk, but the Sunrifle does three times the firepower of a normal Lasblaster, at the Exarch's higher ballistic skill, and you get the utility of causing pinning checks. In this particular instance it seems like from the information given that it would be best to get this upgrade because of the trade off benefits verses its costs. Where this conclusion may become wrong is when you make the choice of getting upgrades so often that every casualty you take dramatically reduces your ability to defeat the enemy (be it by having many tooled up exarch's or characters, unused equipment taking up the place of the ablative wounds you need to protect what is really important, or having to sacrifice important squads when there could have been better alternatives, etc.).

As another way of putting this lets look at it this way. If I need to crush my opponent's flank I know I need two intact squads on location to do it. If I take bare-bones squads and transports I know that I need at least four squads and corresponding transports to ensure that I will get the necessary forces where and when I need them due to incoming fire, local resistance, and my basic troop's damage capabilities. If I take specific upgrades that will help me arrive, retain my squad numbers, and increase my killing efficiency, I will use more points but need less. In this same example I will only need three squads and vehicles to make sure I will have local superiority and the ability to crush this flank as opposed to four.

Some people prefer to take numerous basic squads instead of a few well-equipped units, such as the above. I personally take the route of fielding fewer units than many of my fellow Biel-Tan Brethren. The reason for this is that when you take several basic squads there are many situations in which you are depending on luck more so than I am. If you get lucky you will have more units than I have on the table but it is much easier for you to take a devastating hit than I will. Here is an example:

Say you take a Falcon and just add Spirit Stones to it, giving you a 140pt tank. I will take the same unit with Spirit Stones, but add Vectored Engines and Holo-Fields for an extra 55 points, putting me at 195. A lucky shot will still bring down my tank despite these expensive upgrades, but it statistically takes a high volume of fire (which it absorbs), or a severely unlikely shot, while a basic Falcon has a high chance of being destroyed in a given game if it is saturated with fire. Lets look at the opportunity cost here. You will have 55 points more than me to spend, but I will most likely have my tank on the table all game, while you may or may not complete the objectives you set out for it. In my mind this dependability is worth paying 4/3 the points.

Some upgrades do not make such a significant difference in the scope of your whole army, as the dependability of your transports might be. Below I will talk about 'army themes' which is my take on how to say if each upgrade is really worth its points, or if something else would better take its place.

Army Themes and Upgrade Choices:

Each army has it's own particular method of beating the enemy. Some armies are massive! They use their numbers to gain resilience, and either out last the enemy while using CC or ranged power to slowly destroy them (some IG, Orks, etc). Some armies are inherently resilient but few in numbers, able to weather large amounts of damage while using their elite CC or ranged status to kill the enemy (Space Marines). My army uses incredible speed and a high degree of close combat prowess to draw out or zero in on groups of enemy units and with local superiority I destroy them. When taking upgrades and equipment they should generally be supporting the theme of your army (such as those listed above). The massed army will take some upgrades to kill the enemy, but will mostly use points on models. The second army will try to push and maintain its resilience, as well as maximizing its killing power. My army will take whatever is necessary to ensure speed, and attack power.

The method of my attack in a standard 1v1 annihilation battle is thus: On the first turn I am deployed in whatever way keeps my transports safe from enemy fire, and then it launches full speed either to a staging area (someplace in the middle, out of line of sight where it can more easily attack in the next turn), or into the enemy lines. My fast skimmer transports with the addition of Star Engines are typically able to make it all the way on the first turn. It also allows me to arrive at once instead of piecemeal, and at ideal locations instead of just 3" too far away or 6" to the right from where I wanted to be. With this speed the enemy has one turn to try to shoot at my transports before I disembark. My defensive upgrades (Spirit Stones, Holo-Fields, Vectored Engines) make it unlikely that in this one turn of shooting the enemy can shoot down more than one transport, and often times it will merely crash instead of killing the passengers.

In my last five or six games I have had four transports shot down, now. Only two of them were actually destroyed, and only one of them still having passengers on board. After the first turn, my units disembark, and overpower the flank, and then continue on. When a transport is shot down, enough of my army has made it through (typically a bare minimum of ¾ transports) to lock down the enemy, and keep them secure or kill them while reinforcements arrive (be this jetbike units, Quick Reaction Force transports waiting behind to fill gaps, or the squad from the transport that was shot down).

In light of this strategy many of my upgrades are seen as vital to the success of my attack. So we know that they follow my 'theme' of speed and local superiority. Points wise, these are affective upgrades; I still have enough manpower to destroy a flank, and if used correctly an entire army at once. Without the upgrades taken I would be playing a different type of army, one not capable of moving on the first turn, attacking on the second, and wiping on the third or forth. It would take more time, and more forces, but with these upgrades and their correct use it is very much possible. In other armies there are good and bad upgrade choices, such as adding all the above vehicle upgrades I did to a vehicle that isn't needing that huge resilience or speed, such as a Fire Prism that will most likely spend the game in a secluded table corner shooting through narrow firing lanes at distant enemies, not needing to deploy greatly or taking much, of any, opposing fire.

This is not a full discussion on the topic of upgrades and equipment, but an in-depth look at an Eldar army, which attempts to use the available upgrades to a high degree of efficiency. The above army and strategy it uses functions, and functions excellently while using a large amount of upgrades. I write this, not only to help the community see another aspect of the Biel-Tan army, and how to better use and choose their upgrades, but to try to stop people from ignorantly telling others not to take this or that upgrade because it is 'too' expensive. When an upgrade is a fraction of the cost of the wielder, and increases its efficiency or performance by a large amount, or contributes significantly to the army as a whole it is worth it. There is a value to every upgrade that is based off of its opportunity cost, and greater use within the army. Look at these factors before writing off an item or an army. The upgrade may or may not fit into the army, but be aware of why it does or doesn't. My army has 30% of its points cost in upgrades. This does not cripple it. In other armies it may not function with such upgrades, but the Eldar are capable of fielding such an equipment heavy elite force.

This is an analysis of the Eldar Army in the game of Warhammer 40,000 by Games Workshop. This article does not assume any ownership or rights of Games Workshop intellectual property.